Racing to repair the Oroville Dam spillway — before the rains come

In one of the fastest-paced civic construction jobs in recent U.S. history, hundreds of carpenters, operating engineers and iron workers are rushing to complete repairs to the damaged Oroville Dam spillway.

The crews are trying to beat a Nov. 1 deadline and the Northern California rainy season, which once again will begin to fill the massive reservoir behind the nation’s highest dam.

About 700 construction workers, backed by teams of engineers at the Department of Water Resources, are working in shifts 22 hours a day — building forms, laying steel reinforcement rods and pouring concrete in the damaged middle and lower sections of the chute.